Yes, people should be able to own guns. Maybe make stricter laws to getting a gun, but even than people who kill people with guns are gonna get them anyway, so it doesn't really matter if they banned them on not. Good people are just gonna suffer, murders will get guns regardless.

To everyone comparing cars to guns, the two simply cannot be compared to each other. Cars are not made to inflict pain; they are made to ease our long distance traveling. Arguing that cars cause higher death rates than guns is not even logically correct because everyone in America owns a car and obtaining a car is easier than getting a college degree. Following this logic, of course there would be higher death rates related to vehicles. Not everyone carries a gun around...
And you cannot possibly say that until no one can get a gun, there shouldn't be restrictions. If we follow what you say, then there shouldn't be a law against murders because people still murder. Just because there are a few rulebreakers, no one is exempt from the rules.
In addition, saying that there are those of you who practice firearms regularly and go through classes and evaluation and such doesn't eliminate the fact that there are many others, and maybe even you someday, who experience emotional traumas and go crazy.
Having a restriction is just a preventative.
If one is concerned with having liberty stripped away, then complain about all the laws we have that restraint people from certain things like drinking, smoking, etc.

I never said we should not have restrictions. I merely stated what the anti-gun lobby wants, complete disarmament. Which I believe to be impossible. The Supreme court already has ruled that the government has the right to regulate firearms through laws and certain restrictions, but it cannot deny the right of an individual to own a gun. It gets sticky when you start arguing over which ones and what kinds. Which is what currently is going on right now. Therefore we should still have have the right to own firearms. But of course just because I don't believe universal disarmament is possible, I don't want universal ARMAMENT. Those who chose to carry arms should be allowed it, if permitted by law.

Your second point is what also irritates most gun owners. To the other party we are immediately branded is either a criminal, or a potential criminal. Which is frankly unfair but you are entitled to your own opinion. But it devolves again into the idea that NO ONE is trustworthy and therefore no one should be allowed to have a gun because you're just a potential murderer at some point. If you want to start labeling and judging people that's fine. But it again shows that it's PEOPLE that are the problem, not guns.

Last point, who says I'm not concerned with laws that restrict other freedoms people have? My philosophy is that you should have the right to do whatever you want as long as it doesn't infringe on the rights of others. Life, LIberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

Well first of all, my last point wasn't directed at you. Liberty just shouldn't be brought into the arguments here because obviously no one can have full liberty; else everyone would just go on rampage. Gov't will always restrict how much liberty we really get.

I'm not branding gun owners as potential criminals either. All I'm saying is, as the user somewhere above said, without a gun circulating around, it is easier to control the amount of violence. And I was just trying to stop people from branding themselves as pure innocent gun owners who have nothing to do with the criminals that go around shooting people. I am saying anyone has the potential to turn into a criminal but having a gun makes it more dangerous to society as whole. NOT saying gun owners ARE the only potential criminals as anyone is just as guilty. Again, it is just much safer when there's no gun around; theoretically, no one will be able to go on mass shootings as easily without a gun, and no one will be able to steal a gun from a neighbor or parents to conduct such shootings.

It isn't the guns that hurt people its people that hurt people, and bad people are going to get guns anyway, legal or not. So, we should be allowed to own guns.

True but people have to find a scapegoat to run from the fact humans can have mental issues... or just be plain evil, stricter gun laws have rarely helped through history I think there's a muchhhh deeper cause and effect here... I feel stupid arguing for weapons because they should never even need to exist in the first place.

sure but guns sure make it a hell of a lot easier. Also I think pistols and i guess hunting rifles and shotguns are fine, but there is no reason to need rpgs and assault rifles and the like. They were developed for the sole reason to kill more people faster and more efficiently. The only reason to own one is to kill someone. You can defend yourself just fine with a pistol or shotgun. If you wanna shoot assault rifles and stuff then there could be gun clubs that have them for people to shoot for fun.

To everyone comparing cars to guns, the two simply cannot be compared to each other. Cars are not made to inflict pain; they are made to ease our long distance traveling. Arguing that cars cause higher death rates than guns is not even logically correct because everyone in America owns a car and obtaining a car is easier than getting a college degree. Following this logic, of course there would be higher death rates related to vehicles. Not everyone carries a gun around...
And you cannot possibly say that until no one can get a gun, there shouldn't be restrictions. If we follow what you say, then there shouldn't be a law against murders because people still murder. Just because there are a few rulebreakers, no one is exempt from the rules.
In addition, saying that there are those of you who practice firearms regularly and go through classes and evaluation and such doesn't eliminate the fact that there are many others, and maybe even you someday, who experience emotional traumas and go crazy.
Having a restriction is just a preventative.
If one is concerned with having liberty stripped away, then complain about all the laws we have that restraint people from certain things like drinking, smoking, etc.

I never said we should not have restrictions. I merely stated what the anti-gun lobby wants, complete disarmament. Which I believe to be impossible. The Supreme court already has ruled that the government has the right to regulate firearms through laws and certain restrictions, but it cannot deny the right of an individual to own a gun. It gets sticky when you start arguing over which ones and what kinds. Which is what currently is going on right now. Therefore we should still have have the right to own firearms. But of course just because I don't believe universal disarmament is possible, I don't want universal ARMAMENT. Those who chose to carry arms should be allowed it, if permitted by law.

Your second point is what also irritates most gun owners. To the other party we are immediately branded is either a criminal, or a potential criminal. Which is frankly unfair but you are entitled to your own opinion. But it devolves again into the idea that NO ONE is trustworthy and therefore no one should be allowed to have a gun because you're just a potential murderer at some point. If you want to start labeling and judging people that's fine. But it again shows that it's PEOPLE that are the problem, not guns.

Last point, who says I'm not concerned with laws that restrict other freedoms people have? My philosophy is that you should have the right to do whatever you want as long as it doesn't infringe on the rights of others. Life, LIberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

Well first of all, my last point wasn't directed at you. Liberty just shouldn't be brought into the arguments here because obviously no one can have full liberty; else everyone would just go on rampage. Gov't will always restrict how much liberty we really get.

I'm not branding gun owners as potential criminals either. All I'm saying is, as the user somewhere above said, without a gun circulating around, it is easier to control the amount of violence. And I was just trying to stop people from branding themselves as pure innocent gun owners who have nothing to do with the criminals that go around shooting people. I am saying anyone has the potential to turn into a criminal but having a gun makes it more dangerous to society as whole. NOT saying gun owners ARE the only potential criminals as anyone is just as guilty. Again, it is just much safer when there's no gun around; theoretically, no one will be able to go on mass shootings as easily without a gun, and no one will be able to steal a gun from a neighbor or parents to conduct such shootings.

From a theoretical standpoint I agree with you. No guns means no gun crime. If only that were the end of the argument. If we were talking theory then removing the instrument used in crimes or murders means such crimes or murders involving said tool cease to exist.

But reality is more complex then that. If you're ultimate goal is to reduce "gun" violence then yes eliminating or reducing the number of guns will serve that purpose. But the story doesn't end there. Do you want less "violence" and crime in general? That's even more difficult to address. It's also not easy to draw ready comparisons between disarmed nations and our own because the stats can vary wildly. For instance, Thailand has no gun ownership but higher rate of gun crime than us. Japan has virtually no gun violence when compared to ours. But you have the UK which has 3.5 times the violent crime rate than us but lower gun crime rate because surprise, there are no guns. So it's a lofty and honorable goal to reduce the number of "deaths" due to guns, but I've seen little data to prove that less guns means we are less safe from violent crime.

Plus you have to examine the practical standpoint of how to disarm a nation where there is close to one gun for every man, woman and child in this nation. And not all are going to disarm willingly. Believe me. Short of a foreign power occupying us and FORCING us to disarm like we made Japan and Europe do, this is going to be an expensive and incredibly difficult job to accomplish even just from a logistical standpoint.

So while I understand the position of "let's get rid of all the guns so all the murders will stop", I don't think it's rooted in reality. I think some measures need to be taken to regulate guns, yes more than we currently have now. But I also think more energy needs to be spent in looking at violent crime as a whole and to look at root causes. Like in medicine, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. (and as Doctor I can tell you we don't cure anything....we treat )

If we install super-conductors into the ground everywhere in the world, guns would become useless as well as being able to have flying cars. It's killing 2 birds with one stone.

3 birds with one stone. The superconductors would need to be cooled to extremely low tempertures and that would cool everything around them also. And with them being everywhere it would solve global warming.

3 birds with one stone. The superconductors would need to be cooled to extremely low tempertures and that would cool everything around them also. And with them being everywhere it would solve global warming.

Might as well make that 6000000 birds with one stone since everything around it would freeze to death.

3 birds with one stone. The superconductors would need to be cooled to extremely low tempertures and that would cool everything around them also. And with them being everywhere it would solve global warming.

Might as well make that 6000000 birds with one stone since everything around it would freeze to death.

I think that the American desire to own guns can ultimately be exprest in purely Freudian terms-

The men have some form of castration anxiety, which is why they need to secure themselves by owning something so overtly masculine and phallic. The gun, then, in both shape and purpose, is extremely masculine and phallic- it is a tool of destruction and domination.

The women have penis envy, they want a gun as a replacement for the penis they do not have but unconsciously desire.

Now there's the question of why someone needs weapons capable of mowing down dozens of people at a time. Such weapons, semi-auto assault rifles for instance, are absolutely terrible for hunting. They are very inaccurate at long range, and good long range accuracy is what you need when hunting deer, elk, moose, bear, and etc. Also, you only really need one or two rounds to bring down most game, not a magazine that holds a dozen rounds or more.

People make the argument that they need such weapons for protection. Protection from what? Some say criminals, other say the government. Well, if you're in a situation where you need military weapons to protect yourself from the government then you're already screwed. As for criminals, if they're so bad where you live that you need an a small arsenal of high-caliber, semi-auto rifles to protect yourself then you're doubly screwed. Where the heck do you live, Afghanistan!? Its ridiculous how people come with the lamest excuses for why they need to own enough assault rifles and ammo to equip a small army.

Getting rid of guns isn't the answer. If history has taught us anything its that prohibitions do-not-work. The prohibition of alcohol didn't work, and made the mafia so powerful they could do whatever they wanted without fear of the law. The prohibition of drugs is a failure, its costs tens of thousands of people their lives, turned drug lords into veritable kings with their own private armies, and filled our prisons to maximum capacity. Where has it gotten us? Nowhere, that's where. We've made no progress in the War on Drugs, in fact its gotten worse rather than better. Mexico is a warzone because of our drug prohibition. The same can be said of the prohibition of sharing copyrighted material, the prohibition of child pornography, and the list goes on and on and on. Prohibitions do not work, history has proven this time and time again. Its time we started listening.

So, how can we fix this so something like Newtown, Columbine, or Virginia Tech won't ever happen again without taking away everyone's guns? Yeah, not so easy now is it? But, its not impossible. It'll take several things, there's no easy way out of this, no magic pill that can fix everything. I'll also take courage, lots of it. First, we need to change how we treat mental illness in the United States, and better measures need to put into place that prevents unstable people from owning guns. Second, we need to improve the quality of life overall for everyone in the country. Most of the gun violence in America is a direct result of poverty. Many people turn to violent crime because they feel like they have nothing more to loose. The factors which create such an environment must be changed, and we need the courage to make it happen. Even if it means we have to shove those to the side those who point and scream "Socialism" at us, but have nothing more constructive to bring to the table on how we should fix this problem (I'm looking at you Republicans).

This nation is sick, we have to cure the patient, not just treat the symptoms. We've tried that already, its not working.

As for criminals, if they're so bad where you live that you need an a small arsenal of high-caliber, semi-auto rifles to protect yourself then you're doubly screwed. Where the heck do you live, Afghanistan!? Its ridiculous how people come with the lamest excuses for why they need to own enough assault rifles and ammo to equip a small army.

That's assuming the status quo continues.

In the event of a societal collapse, depending where you live, an assault rifle may be necessary since some areas (aka Los Angeles) could very well degrade to an Afganistan level of chaos until an agreed upon order is restored.